This Saturday, like every year on August 13th since 1976, is International Left Handers' Day. A club of left handed people started this initiative to raise awareness about some serious issues that left handers need to deal with on a daily basis in this world that is dominated (in numbers at least) by right handed people.

I myself am left handed, and going to school when I was a kid, it was pretty unique. It wasn't until I was older and attended Hogeschool Rotterdam en Omstreken that I realized that among my fellow engineering students there was a pretty large amount of left handers.

Posted on Wednesday 10 August 2011 at 6:34 pm in category: Abby
In the past week 7 people read this, in the past month 34 people read this.

A conversation I had with my 6 year old daughter today (over the phone):

Abby: Dad, you need to fix my bikeMe: Oh, what's wrong with it?Abby: I think it has a flat tireMe: Oh no, a flat tire again?Abby: Yes, I think so. But it's only flat in one spot.Me: Only flat in one spot? Is that the spot at the bottom?Abby: It's the spot where the wheel is touching the street, so I need you to fix it so that spot stays at the top.

Well, today I succesfully moved my website from it's old stomping grounds at MijnDomein.nl to one of the servers of A Small Orange. Although these moves can take up to 72 hours, they say, it was done with 3 hours.

I don't know if you've noticed the speed of the website now, but I have. Loading pages is 3 to 6 times faster all of a sudden! In the "back-end" of the website, where I write these blogposts, the difference at least feels like it is 10 times faster!

Apparently the people that use the free WiFi in Starbucks coffeeshops are starting to become a problem. I have to admit I have done this too: you go into a coffeshop, order a cup of coffee (maybe a pastry), and sit down with your laptop at one of the tables. Nobody bothers you, and you can sit there virtually forever.

Some Starbucks restaurants in New York City want to put a stop to this.

We all know the goverment can be stupid sometimes. This actually goes for any government, not just the US government, but here is an example of the stupidity of the government of the USA, the land of innovation and hi-tech stuff:

You are looking at the logo of the new Department of Innovation Blog of the Smithsonian Institute, an institute that runs with government money. Everybody knows the Smithsonian. In their own words:

Founded in 1846, the Smithsonian is the world's largest museum and research complex, consisting of 19 museums and galleries, the National Zoological Park and nine research facilities.

From an institue like that, you might expect some technical expertise, right? Well, I am sorry to break it to you, but they are stupid too. Look at that logo again.

Not only can 3 interlocking gears like that never move anywhere, the pitch (distance between the teeth on the gears) is not the same for all three either. This means that even if the two smaller ones were not interlocked, the whole construction would come to a screeching halt after half a turn.

Now, I admit that somebody that makes logos for a living might not know that, but you would think that a whole committee of well-payed people over there at the prestigious Smithsonian Institute have looked at it and approved it. Good luck competing with China!